“The Outsiders” Memories w/ Francis Ford Coppola
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I don't think I need to give any introduction. I mean, if you don't know who Coppola is and you're listening to me, I can't believe that. I have not spoken to Francis in any real depth, probably ever, on Outsiders. I was 17. What am I going to say to the great man? And then, you know, life has taken us in different directions. So much to talk about. And it's an honor that he reached out and wanted to be on the show to talk about Megalopolis.

which is one of his life's work. This is going to be amazing. Francis Ford Coppola, next. You know, it's amazing. You hardly look, I know you must be many years older than you were when you were a kid, but you don't look a lot different. You stayed trim and you've got the same smile. How nice. Francis, I'm so glad to see you and to talk to you

I mean, you've meant so much to me and I feel like it's been so, well, it has been so many years since we've had an opportunity to talk. So thank you for coming on. And I just, my heart is full to see you and see how great you look and that you're still killing it. Well, you're very kind and you too. So we're survivors. I saw Megalopolis last night and I have so much I want to unpack. First of all,

I love that you finally were able to make a movie that you have been taught. I remember you talking about it on Outsiders. Really? I didn't know that I had yet formulated that opinion. It was just an idea. I mean, it was just a sort of sense of... I remember hearing the title. That's what I remember. That you have put your own money into it and you've made a movie unlike anything I have ever seen with some of my favorite actors ever.

Is it everything you had hoped it would be? In truth, it's beyond what I hope because the actors are such a wonderful cast. And as you know, movies are a collaboration between all the elements, but mainly the actors. You know, I've always felt that, and I've said it,

A director doesn't get a great performance out of an actor. The director is like a coach. He helps. He sets the scene. He sets the situation. He might have a good thing to say now and now and then when there's a problem, but the actor does it, let's face it. And the great performances given throughout the history of cinema have been done by great people.

great actors and you know very often the highest statistics of who becomes directors is more than assistant directors more than writers more than any other personnel actors make up the lion's share of those artists who go on to make make films starting in the silent era most of the silent geniuses

in that era were actors or magicians. Actors or magicians. But an actor is kind of a magician when you think what they're able to do. Obviously, you made the movie and wrote it way before...

the emergence of somebody like Elon Musk. But I definitely was thinking about an Elon Musk-type character watching Adam Driver's character. I think that's a certainty, yes. I read Walter Isaacson's wonderful book on Elon Musk. Elon Musk is basically a very unusual person, but he's a genius. And his goals are...

People don't understand his goals, but the Walter Isaacson book explains his goal. He really...

He, believe it or not, he wants humanity to survive. He doesn't want an asteroid to be able to come around and just wipe it out. He wants to get people out there in the universe so that humanity will survive under any scenario. And I think even his present political stance is he's trying to do what he can to have no regulations. Right. Right.

He doesn't want any regulations because his passion to get us into Mars is so real. And he does it for good reason. He does it because he loves humanity, I think. Maybe I'm wrong. Who knows? I've never met the guy, but I do think, based on the Isakson book, that he's quite a genius. And after all, who was really the figure going back in more ancient times but Prometheus himself?

Prometheus, the titan of Greek mythology who stole fire and gave it to man so that mankind could have the arts. Prometheus is a prototype for even our Christian belief. Why Prometheus was chained on a mountain with an eagle picking at his liver, suffering for humanity. Where have you heard that?

that someone must suffer for us in order for us to be realized. So yes, our mythology is full of Prometheus, Christ, these gods,

Present geniuses, Archimedes and Elon Musk. It's a strange evolution of myth. Galileo, they wanted to burn him at the stake, I believe. Everyone who comes up with a new idea, it makes everyone very uncomfortable to come up

You know, it's one thing to come up with a little art film. Like, I made Rumblefish because I wanted to make an art film for kids. The kids at the time didn't really respond to it. It was a flop, and I actually lost ownership of that movie because my deal always was that if it didn't earn back what it cost, whoever put the money up got it. So I don't own Rumblefish.

But over time, I've met so many wonderful filmmakers who told me, you know, the reason I make movies is because I saw Rumblefish. And that makes me, I can't be more happy to have. That's the big award. It's not a check. It's not a statuette they give you. It's that when a young person comes and says they make films because something they saw of yours made them want to.

I remember people always obviously ask me about Outsiders, and one of the things I try to impart to them that they just don't believe was Rumblefish was the cool movie to be in. That was the movie that all of us, we loved being in Outsiders, but we were like, wait a minute, Rumblefish, it's going to be in black and white. And it's such a visually stunning movie. And, of course, Mickey is in it at the height of...

his powers. And I remember even back in the casting session that how much you were a fan of Mickey Rourke's and you finally got him in the movie. That casting of Outsiders, as you remember, was interesting because all the kids did it in front of each other. And that could have been, you know, a nightmare with them saying, wait a second, that guy is good. I'm not going to

But you were all young guys who loved acting and you applauded each other, even your competition. It was a wonderful, I'll never forget how positive those casting sessions were and how supportive you were with your own competition. Francis, I remember all of us, we would help each other do each other's hair.

In the Zotro bathroom, we would be like, oh, I don't like that. Let me see. This looks better on you, and let me do that. So we literally did our own hair and makeup in terms of supporting each other. And I don't know if you remember this, but I remember that we gave the Greasers less per diem, and they had chromier transportation and accommodations than the Socs. The Socs got nice hotels and stuff like that, but the Greasers had to live in a basement apartment.

rooms that we found. And you remember we used to do Tai Chi in the morning. I have two thoughts. One is, here are my thoughts, because it's so interesting, this perspective. My perspective is I'm 17 years old. I barely know anything about anything. You know everything about everything. And I go, okay, so Francis is trying to set up this dynamic where

The greasers are these downtrodden, struggling. And meanwhile, every actor who's playing a Soch who's got more per diem, all they really want to do is be a greaser anyway. That's true. But, you know, there's a lot I didn't understand, which is why there's two versions. And, you know, I really...

And Warner Brothers agreed that the version that is the version of The Outsiders is the one that's called the complete novel. Because I really, you know, I tell you, I was offered to write the script when I was young of Midnight Cowboy. And I turned it down because I just didn't understand enough of what a

guy who goes to be a male hustler in New York really was. I didn't, I had no frame of reference.

And in a lot of the scenes that Soda Pop was in, he's in bed with his brother, and there was a sort of, you know, a homoerotic aspect to it, which, you know, they're now saying about Abraham Lincoln, which is natural. But I didn't have a frame of reference, and I was frightened at one point that that was going to come across as,

to hurt the picture, so I took it out. But when later I went to my little granddaughter's class shortly after that to talk about The Outsiders, they said, well, where's the scene where Soda Pop talks about being in love with his brother when they knew the book better than I? And I said, I was wrong. And I made a new version and even put in a lot of early Elvis Presley. And I'm sure you've seen both versions.

But the official version of The Outsiders is the one that has everything in the book in it because the book was right and I was wrong. I've always wondered, obviously, what happened. My notion was that the original Outsiders was focused very much on the boys on the run with Dallas. It actually begins meeting Dallas. He's the first person you meet.

And in the book, the first person you meet are the Curtis brothers. And it was very Curtis brothers centric. So I'm super glad that the new cut is out. No, it was, as I explained, I went with little Gia Coppola, who now is a big movie director, as her latest film, The Last Showgirl. Yes, of course. She was a little kid. I went to her class once.

And they wanted to talk about The Outsiders. And I went and talked. And they all asked me about the scenes that weren't in the movie. And I realized that I made a version that was according to what those little kids said. I went back and showed it to them. And then they were happy. I also changed some of the music to...

I had my father doing a lot of the music and he wanted to write tracks for everything. And I had the difficulty of saying, well, but then those, because he wanted the whole score to sound like God with the wind. Yes. You know, da-da-da-da-da-da. Sure, yeah. But I've seen, well, they'd be listening to Elvis Presley's old, early songs. And so I did that and I put that in the new version. I had the rights there.

to do the Elvis Presley saga. I just think the movie is much better in the complete novel format. And Warner Brothers, that's the official version. I remember that you played Elvis' on the set for us every time we shot. And interestingly, it wasn't...

It wasn't multiple Elvis songs. It was the same. I don't know if you remember. It was the same Elvis song always. It wasn't like one day you got this song and one day you got that song. It was all Elvis. It was only I Want You, I Need You, I Love You. Really? I don't know. I don't remember. But I remember Elvis.

You know that I remember the, you know who was on that shoot? She was a little kid there. She was a young girl. Remember Dana Spiotta? Of course. You know what happened to her? No. She became a major novelist. If you look her up.

She's a best-selling novelist of serious proportion. She's very respected. She was like a little 13-year-old kid hanging around with all the boys. A lovely kid, a wonderful kid, but she became a great writer. Where else can you go surfing and skiing?

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opportunity. More and more companies are building their businesses in Ohio or relocating because they see the opportunity to pioneer innovation in a place their people and their families will love to live. The cost of living in Ohio is 11% less than the national average, which means your paycheck goes further for all the things you love to do. Not only will you save money, but you'll save a much more precious resource.

time. The average commute in Ohio is just 24 minutes, meaning you get home quicker to be with people you love. I'm from Ohio. I don't need an advertisement to tell me how great Ohio is. My whole family is from Ohio. My grandpa ran the Spot Restaurant in Sydney, Ohio. Greatest hamburgers and pies in the world. Thank you very much. It's still there. Started in 1911. Lots of great stuff. It's

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was the mention of the dingbat news. That's so funny that you remember that. Well, I burst out laughing in the theater because that's, you know, my, you know how, I mean, you're older than I am, but even at my age, it's like people get frozen in time at the era where you knew them. So for me, Sophia is,

is still writing the Dingbat News every week. How did you... Where did you see that? At the studio? The movie? Where did I see it? When I did The Outsiders, I had lost everything. And that... Sophia used to do the Dingbat News with Bernie Gersten's daughters, who also now become very important in the series. So where did you run into the Dingbat News? The Dingbat News was...

She would do it on what they used to call the ditto machines in the school that we were using for rehearsal. Oh, that's right. She was there. In fact, she's in that scene. The Dairy Queen. That's a funny scene because this little girl with buck teeth comes and says, oh, you got a dime? We don't have enough for a Dairy Queen. And Matt said, get out of here. Then he says, that was a close call. Yeah.

Yeah, the Think Back News, yeah. Isn't that wonderful? Yeah. And look at Sophia now. She's...

She's much more famous than I am. You have the DNA. That's that Coppola DNA for sure. Well, I think it's more the way we spent the summers. We used to, in the summers, all those kids and Jason Schwartzman and all of the relatives used to come. And I used to say, okay, we're going to have creativity camp. And they said, oh, we don't want creativity camp. We want to fish and we want to...

I said, well, you're going to fish and swim, but we're going to write songs and we're going to do one-act plays and we're going to have fun. And they said, all right, if we have to. That's when Sophia directed her first play and Jason Forsman had to act in it. He had written the play. So it was more the kids and the cousins playing.

It was like summer camp every summer, but with their relatives. When you talk about having camps at the property, I remember during Outsiders, that was all going on. You had just gone to that terrible time where, you know, the studio was gone and it was so full of angst for you. And as like a 17-year-old, for it to even translate to a 17-year-old, you know it had to have been something. Because, you know, 17-year-olds don't know about mortgages. They don't know about any of that stuff.

But I can remember a day where you were on the phone with Ellie and you were telling her not to let in the repossessors. I'll never forget it as long as I live. And you're like, no, no, just don't answer the gate. Just action. It was...

Just an amazing thing. You know, I remember that period because that was true. Since the estate was the biggest state, the process servers, you know, basically had a problem because they had to come into a private gate and then go along. Normally, they just go to your house. So when a process server came, LE...

would disappear. We'd all disappear. And the only one who would stand up on the gate was Sophia at like six. And she would say, you're not allowed to come here. Leave immediately. This is Tara. She was so funny. This is Tara.

You know how you have memories that are important to you, but they've been so long and you've thought about them for so many years that you begin to question your own memory about them. And I've always had that. I said, I swear to God, Francis was on the phone. No, it's true. I was. My poor wife, I mean...

You know, I would do these crazy things, but she's the one who would have the grocery store say, well, Mrs. Coppola, we can't give you credit anymore. You're going to have to pay cash if you want to buy food. You know, it was very embarrassing for her, poor thing. My condolences. I always loved Ellie. She was such a nice woman. I don't know anyone who didn't love her. She was such an angel. I mean, I was so lucky and so smart to...

To have, you know, 61 years, it's hard to lose her, you know, because she was my rock. She was the one I would check with and do my reality checks. I remember she used to tell me, Francis, give your brain a rest. And I would say, but Ellie, I don't know how to. The only way I know how to do it is to start another project.

Have two projects at once. I can do that. How do you feel that you were the pioneer of Video Village? Video Village didn't even have a name. No, it didn't. And it's a big mistake because... Oh, I'm so curious to know. Oh, this is amazing. What I was taught by a great, my directing teacher was Miss Dorothy Arsland, a woman...

and a wonderful director and a fabulous teacher. And she told me, and I remember that, always sit at the same place next to the camera, not only because you have the best view of the cast, and I do that even with a video up because I have the video thing at my feet,

But she says, it's not just so that you can see the actors well. It's so they can see you because they're doing it for you. And if they can't see you, they don't know how to gauge what they're doing. And so whenever I see a movie and I hear a cut and I hear a director say, that was great. Do it again. More energy. And I realize that he's a mile away in a video tent.

The actor has to always be right there so the actors can see how they're reacting, you know, because they're using you. And I learned that from Miss Arsner, who was a great woman.

So does that mean the Silverfish has been retired to a museum? No, the Silverfish was... You can go into it afterwards and edit in there, but you can't direct. I never direct from there, unless I'm mad at Dennis Hopper or Shia LaBeouf. Then I'll say, do what you want, I'm not coming out. Amazing. Which I did to both Dennis Hopper and Shia LaBeouf. But they were great, what they did. ♪

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People ask me a lot about what it's like to work with you. And I think among your gifts, Francis, is when there's a happy accident, you know it, you receive it, and you use it. Absolutely. And it sounds really simple, but you would be shocked how many directors, if a cat jumped up on Marlon Brando's lap in the middle of a speech...

would cut. If a hat blew off of the camera operator on a crane shot on The Outsiders and tumbled down the street and Emilio picked it up and said, hey, I got a hat, they would laugh and cut and it would never be in the movie. And both those things are memorable, happy accidents. Another thing I do is that if somebody else has a great idea

I always use it, but I'll tell the truth. In other words, people ask me, who came up with the line in The Godfather, take the gun, leave the gun, take the cannoli? That was when Cicastolano said that. It wasn't my idea. They asked me, whose idea was it to have the helicopters play

Wagner, they think, because my family were musicians. That was John Milius' idea. So not only do I use everybody else's idea other than mine when it seems appropriate, but I'll tell you the truth. You can ask me right now anything you like in any movie that you like and ask me whose idea it was, and I'll tell you, and the odds are it wasn't mine. I only learned years later that our long rehearsal period on Outsiders at the School

was in a large part because there was still a question about the budget and getting the movie done. I remember shooting the entire movie on a green screen during rehearsal. Did you ever look at that footage? Does that footage exist? Oh, yeah, no. I'm the one who invented and came up with the term pre-visualization. Right. And now that's an industry.

I thought people didn't like that name because they said, well, how can there be pre-visualization? There's visualization. I said, but this is a step before when you make decisions and you have a simulation of what the film might be like.

And we took that, and I remember on Rumblefish, we made the whole movie on a green screen and got Stuart Copeland to come and be a drummer. And I was on the bass myself, and Roman was playing something.

And Stuart Copeland said, you know, I really love this movie. Could you give me a chance to write the score? And I said, sure. And Stuart Copeland wrote the music for it. That was his first score. You also had Tom Waits and Outsiders. A movie is a collaboration. Theater was, you know, there are a lot of art forms that you're pretty much alone and you're painting a picture or you're sitting and composing.

But theater begins as a collaboration. There's a whole bunch of people working on it. And movies are the child of theater. So, you know, the collaborative group is very exciting and is the basis of the art form that we now call cinema. I also was sad to see that we lost Fred Roos this year. The cast of The Outsiders and of American Graffiti is largely Fred's vision.

And Fred absolutely loved you. I'll tell you that. Oh, thank you. Yeah, he was always a big supporter of mine. And I think there should be a, they have a casting. I think they now have a casting award. Yeah, of course they do. They have the casting awards. It should be called the Fred Roos Award. I think you're right. Why don't they, this is, okay, I know there are a lot of people in the industry listening. You got to call that the Fred Roos Award because you look at the list of actors.

that Fred cast. I don't see anybody that ever came close. That's true. And partly the reason he had that incredible list is he took the most extraordinary notes. They were very tiny. He had every actor he had ever seen, he wrote down these notes as to what he thought was

And I learned a lot about casting from Fred, as you can imagine. Have you seen The Outsiders musical? Yes, yes. Have you? I have not yet. Obviously, it's clearly great, right? Did you enjoy it? It is great. What's wonderful about it is that the director took it in a different direction than the movie did, but a good direction. And I went and saw it, and I was so admired that the film was there

But it's really the book. And she went a different way. And when I went to see it, there were so many kids in that show that wanted to say hi that instead of going backstage, they all came out of the audience and I sat with them and did a cohabit with them. Oh, that's amazing. Yeah. And it's a wonderful show. The director did a good job. Yeah. And you should go see it. They would love to see you. I'll go. But you should have them do Tai Chi, Francis. You missed your opportunity. Yeah.

Do you remember when somehow you all found former greasers who at the time would have been in their 40s or whatever they were, they were adults and divided the cast up and we all had to go to their houses and spend the night. And I remember so vividly being on a couch with a furnace in a basement of these people. I did not know me and Tom Cruise looking at each other going,

They could, they might come down and kill us tonight. It was, I mean, the stuff that we did, Francis, was so amazing. I mean, when we played football, tackle football, tackle in the street to toughen us up. And I'll never forget Tommy Howell. We had to talk about Tommy Howell. What an amazing guy.

That movie, he was great. But he herded us up in the huddle. I'll never forget it. And, you know, as you know, Tommy was the son of a stuntman. Right. And knew his way around the business in a very unusual way for a 15-year-old. Right. And I remember Tommy saying, hey, man, if we get tackled and break a leg, Francis will ship us out and somebody else will be playing pony boy tomorrow. Right.

And so we quit. We quit the tackle football game. That's not accurate, but what I would have done is that Ponyboy would be wearing a splint and a crutch the rest of the movie. That's what happened with the bandage in Apocalypse Now when Willard cuts his face and he has this stupid bandage on it. I got stuck with it the whole movie. We need to talk about Shia LaBeouf's eyebrows, Francis. Oh, they change, I think. Yeah, they change.

literally he's got no eyebrows in one scene and then he's got eyebrows that are bigger than yours and mine combined. Well, that was, you know, we had the great, you never worked with her, but we had the great Milena Cananero.

who did the makeup. She did the costumes for most of Kubrick and she's won eight Oscars or something. But she doesn't care so much about continuity. And I was constantly, you know, I had the costumes of the picture were a very ambitious part of the movie to bring an artist like that. But there were many, you know, and he didn't meet some of the people, but there are, as you can imagine,

There were a lot of exotic people on Megalopolis, and I must say that I found Adam Driver a really spectacular collaborator. Oh, good, good. You know, there are some actors who are really super intelligent, like Warren Beatty is a brilliant person, and he gets great performances with this intelligence.

Some of them are just wildly talented and it's magic, you know. Duval is like that. So Duval has a rule where he doesn't want to do more than two takes. I begged him for the third take where he tells Marlon Brando that his son is dead.

And I always think, what would happen if you had Bobby Duvall do a scene with Warren Beatty? Warren Beatty wants to do 50 takes. Right. And Duvall wants to take two. What is your philosophy on that? Do you think there's a perfect amount? I mean, obviously, the perfect take is the take that you respond to. But all things being equal. There's lots of rules. Spielberg has a very good, really, always prints the first take.

that the actor actually does of the scene, thinking there's a certain electricity. I think he's right. You know, there's Tocino, who has incredible intelligence and incredible talent. So he's got both. But so does Adam Driver. He has a tremendously talented guy, but he's also...

uh a very intelligent person and i i finally would would say to him adam would you do me a favor would you look at the 22 takes we have of this we did a lot of some one or senior world where camera does a six-page scene in one take yep and and would you look at all of them and tell me what you think are the best ones you know and he he loved he loved collaborating that way he said

You know, he suggested things and he said, I feel embarrassed. I'm suggesting changes to you. I said, don't be embarrassed. That's a help to me. And the movie was made in a very, all the actors collaborated. I mean, what's her name? Aubrey Plaza is a hoot. Yeah, she's great. She's a character. She's wonderful. And, you know, she can be sexy and funny at the same time.

She said, I'll tell you, she promised me that she would die and have people laughing. I said, I'll take it. That sounds like Aubrey. Yeah, she's wonderful. Was there any Atlas Shrugged, right? Thematically, mass world builder. There's a little bit of Atlas Shrugged in it. Sure. I mean, how can you not have it in a vision like that where there's this.

What's his name? Howard, no. John Galt. John Galt, yeah. Yeah, the guy in the fountainhead is Howard. That was directed by King Vidor. Another thing is that any movie I have loved in my life, and I'm old, I put something of the movie in Megalopolis. I could show you things that come from every movie that I ever loved as a kid.

including the first, which was The Shape of Things to Come by H.G. Wells. By the way, I loved when the statues, what you thought were statues...

would groan and be real. That was a really great visual treat. - Well, that comes from an idea of the famous Indian chief who went to Paris hundreds of years ago and debated morality with some Frenchmen. And the Indian chiefs, finally the Frenchman said, "Well, you have no ideals. "Your ideals change." And the Indian chief said, "Well, you have ideals, "but you don't adhere to them."

And that's what gave me the idea that we have wonderful ideas of justice and wisdom and all these things, but we make statues to them, but we don't incorporate them in our lives. We have a statue of justice, and she just weeps because no one listens to her. And that's what gave... And Roman shot that stuff. That was all, of course... Well, that was all live action with miniatures because, you know, they were actors...

to make it look like big statues. So the Citroen that he was driving was like to hold in your hand like that. Okay, I wanted to ask you about the Citroen because the first time I ever saw a Citroen was at Martin Sheen's house when he arrived back from the Philippines from Apocalypse Now. Is there a Citroen connection that I'm missing? Well, I always loved that car and I had a Citroen limousine. I probably sent that car to bring him home. Yeah.

I always thought the Citroen is a car. I would drive it in New York when I was making Cotton Club, and people looked like it was a, you know, that they'd never seen a car like that. But on the other hand, you could fly today, if you could fly in a Concorde,

which you can't do. People would look at that like that's a car of the future. A lot of great stuff in the past looks like the future. The Citroën being one. You know the story that the Citroën that is in the picture of Megalopolis was the same limousine that De Gaulle was shot in

And they got the tire, but they weren't able to kill him because the car runs on three tires because it has that hydraulic suspension. Then he got away. That actual Citroën? Yeah, that's incredible. In fact, they made a movie about that called, I forget the name, but it's the story of how they tried to assassinate de Gaulle, but they couldn't get him because he was in this amazing car that drove on three. In other words, it's the only car that can drive away on three tires. Wow.

Three wheels. Tell me what's next. And by the way, I love that I'm asking you this. How old are you, Francis? I'm 85. 85. You're exactly my father's age. I love it. I love it. Is your father living? Still alive and looks like you. You look great, by the way. You look really, really well to me. Really, really great. I was always overweight, as you probably remember me in throughout the years. But I finally realized that there's not a lot of 300-pound, 85-year-old guys walking around. So I...

I went to Duke Fitness and I lost about 60 pounds. Does that mean no more pasta dinner? You're not cooking every Friday night for wrap parties? Well, I don't make that kind of, I make much more healthy. I still cook well, but I can cook vegetables very well. I can make pasta, but I can't eat it. I don't even, I don't drink. I just drink maybe a little wine once a week.

Those are all calories. There are only two vices that you can do all you want without any payback. I call them vices. Two sources of pleasure. One is learning and the other is music, if you don't listen to it too loud. So I do a lot of reading and I do a lot of listening to music. And are you writing? Yeah, no, I do. I would like to... I always say this. I'd love to make a movie that would be fun.

So I have a project that's somewhat based on a...

I want to make a musical that uses dance a lot to tell the story. I directed once when I was young and had made The Godfather. Everyone offered me opportunities to direct operas or plays, and I wanted to do it all. So I once directed a play of Noel Coward called Private Lives. Yeah, of course. It's a great, great, great play. It's a great, great play.

great play and I learned I loved it and I did a very unusual version of it that used a lot of his wonderful songs and and so I I have a style of that type of a movie that I want to I want to make now that would be a sort of musical but they used a lot that would use a lot of dance and would be very

Like those great movies that Irene Dunn and Cary Grant used to make, like The Awful Truth or My Favorite Wife or the so-called, or even Bringing Up Baby and all that. Those ones, I'd love to do that. Then I have a big project that is unusual because I want to do it live. In other words, I want to do a big project

ambitious movie with an interesting theme, but I want to do it as a live cinema. Did you ever read the book I wrote called Live Cinema and its Techniques? No, I haven't, but I'll go get it for sure. I'll send it. I want to sign it for you. When I go home for Christmas, I'll sign it to you and Anahid will...

Bug Anahid. She'll have your book. Anahid is still in... Anahid. Oh, my God. No way. Give her a hug. I haven't seen her since I was 20 years old. Yeah, I'll sign one to you. You'll like it. It's got a good section on...

on acting and many things you'll find interesting. Amazing. So that's what I want to do. I may have a new practice. No director's ever done it, but when I make films now, I'm going to put in the end credits all the movies I'd like to make before I die. So that means what I do, they'll be on my pictures, the movies I didn't get to make. Wow.

That's a good idea. Yeah. I wish you another 86 years, Francis, and I hope we get— Oh, you're so kind. And I wish that to you. How old are you now? You're about Roman's age, right? 60, yeah, 60. I think Roman and I are almost the exact same age, right? Well, that's beautiful. That's how old—well, you knew Gio, didn't you? Of course! Yeah, of course. Of course, Gio was alive then, yeah. Well, Gio would be 60, and of course, Gia is his—

his daughter but she never she used to she used to cry as a little girl she said I never got to see him I never even got to see him once she said oh that's so sweet that's so sweet she was when she directs she has his picture on the camera oh that's the best well Francis thank you so much thank you Robin wonderful luck to you and your family and I hope I see you in person someday soon yeah

Way overdue, for sure. Thanks, and congrats on Megalopolis and everything that's upcoming. Thank you. Thanks, you, Rob. Thanks, buddy. Thank you. Bye-bye. I have all the feels right now. I've got a lot of feels. You know that thing like when someone's in your life at a certain age and they're someone like Francis, you kind of get frozen in amber in that relationship. And so...

You know, I've made a lot of movies, made a lot of TV shows, but I still feel when I'm talking to Francis like I'm the 17-year-old who's doing his first movie. And I felt that just now. So if you found the interview wanting, I beg your forgiveness. But that was amazing. So thanks for listening. There's more to come here on Literally With Me, Robbie Lou.

You've been listening to Literally with Rob Lowe, produced by me, Sean Doherty, with help from associate producer Sarah Begar and research by Alyssa Grau. Engineering and mixing by Joanna Samuel. Our executive producers are Rob Lowe for Low Profile, Nick Liao, Adam Sachs, and Jeff Ross for Team Coco, and Colin Anderson for Stitcher. Booking by Deirdre Dodd. Music by Devin Bryant.

Special thanks to Hidden City Studios. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time on Literally.

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